


White Roses of Scotland

by behzaintfunny



Category: Outlander (TV)
Genre: Emotional Baggage, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Fluff and Angst, Huddling For Warmth, Lots of Scottish vocabulary in all its glory!, Missing Scene, Multi, Suicidal Thoughts, Thunderstorms
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-07-06
Updated: 2019-07-06
Packaged: 2020-04-24 07:03:49
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 6,244
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/19168219
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/behzaintfunny/pseuds/behzaintfunny
Summary: December, 1754. Ardsmuir prison. James Fraser is constantly surrounded by hundreds of people, yet more alone than ever. There appears to only be a single light in the everlasting darkness, however faint it may be.





	White Roses of Scotland

**Author's Note:**

> I had the feeling of being at the bottom of a grave, with the blood frozen in my veins, unable either to stir or to weep.
> 
> — Simone de Beauvoir, tr. by Justin O’Brien, from “The Woman Destroyed"

It seemed as though all there will ever be is cold.

Wearisome, cruel cold that gnaws at your bones the way insects crawl into the dead flesh that we all eventually become. It's not a positive thought in the slightest but it has been long since any happy thoughts filled his head. It is as though the darkness of this world has finally consumed his mind whole.

Jamie awakens at the sound of a horrible thunderstorm roaring throughout the neverending sky, his chest heaving with a breath he couldn't seem to catch. He opens his eyes only to see the walls closing in on him, edging closer and closer, growing bolder by the second as taunted by the ungodly sound of thunder. His head hurts with an ache never to be forgotten, and suddenly he's back on the overwhelmingly loud moor that makes him wish his eardrums would burst and be done with it.

He'd give everything, anything, simply to forget.

Jamie forces himself to stand upright, the shackles on his ankles disallowing proper blood flow well enough already, and his chains rustle behind him. He walks up to the nearest wall before collapsing against it, still careful not to wake anyone, breathing weakly. It is cold and overgrown with moss, reeking of the sea which in turn causes his stomach to churn, but only for naught, since there is nothing in it to vomit with. His feet refuse to cooperate properly after close to two years of being constricted, and it is only for his will of mind that he doesn't collapse atop the form of a person sleeping beside his feet.

The sky roars with yet another thunder, the storm picking up pace. Jamie's eyes fill with tears as he starts beating pathetic fists against the solid rock wall of Ardsmuir prison. He looks properly at his hands, thoroughly bruised and devoid of any healthy colour, only the sickly grey merging with purple.

The shackles are heavy, primitive work not intended to be worn for such prolonged periods of time for it to be even slightly safe. There is a sturdy chain connecting the two wrists, not allowing him much movement space whatsoever, that, too, aged badly with scarce marks of corrosion. His every move carries a harrowing sound, the clinking of chains which only grows more serious against the stone wall. His knuckles begin to bleed, only one more drizzle of blood on the already maimed wall, which in turn causes him to stop, however reluctantly. The terrible noises outside never cease to an end, and neither does his constant headache.

Jamie rustles his chains weakly before bringing them up to his neck. The brush of metal against his skin feels just as heavenly as it does gruesome, the possibilities it gives all so real, so palpable. His eyes close as he sighs weakly. It would only take a few moments, he _knows_ it, before...

"Everything alright, Mac Dubh?"

The voice stirs him awake from his reverie, his hands falling down to lay at his hips impeccably fast. The idle freedom, however surreal and fleeting -- gone.

"Aye, of course, Hayes." Jamie blinks away the tears that threaten to escape his eyes, "You need no' worry about me. Go back to sleep."

He is met with silence. He doesn't believe Hayes to truly be as blinded by a false image of Jamie as to misinterpret the picture before his very eyes so terribly, and because of that he is much thankful for Hayes' silence.

"Ye ken, it's alright to fear it." Hayes whispers, and for a fleeting moment it is as though there truly were no other soul in the cell but them, "I ken death comes for all of us but that's no' a reason not to be afraid o' it."

"I'm nae scared of death," Jamie feels his neck itch with a long forgotten invisible burn that used to haunt his dreams so, "Only o' the life I'm supposed to live now, after everything that's happened."

"I ken it's hard. 'Tis like that for all of us. But it will get better, will it no'?" Hayes raises a hand to rest at Jamie's ankle, just above where the shackles constrict it, "Is that no' what ye've said, Mac Dubh? That there is hope for us yet?"

"It's only... It's hard to remember that, sometimes." Jamie heaves a breath as another thunder hits, the monstrously raging rain all more clear when he's so close to the wall. He can practically feel its force against his body, all too real to believe impossible, as it runs all the way down his bones in hopes to drown him whole.

"Ye should try to get some rest." Hayes tells him with a squeeze on the ankle, "'Tis no' a good time to be awake. I'll watch over ye as ye sleep, in case anything happens."

When Jamie touches the wall again with shaky fingers, he can almost feel the storm pulsating throughout his entire body, the energy of it tingling inside his bones and sending tiny, precious sparks into his blood. Jamie only ever knew one thing that caused him to feel this way, just the one. His head pierces with the same force the lightning strikes with, for some memories are perhaps better off left untouched forever.

Jamie would only feel so wonderously alive when he touched Claire.

Only, Claire is not present in the spirit of the storm, nor inside the prison walls.

She's gone. Truly gone.

"There will be no need for that, Hayes." Jamie's hand falls off the wall with one last forlorn melody, "Take yer rest. I'll be fine."

Hayes falls asleep in a manner of seconds, already far too exhausted, a weak hand slipping off Jamie's ankle. Jamie is envious of how easily he manages to find solace in sleep, for he knows he shall find none for as long as the storm continues.

Perhaps not ever.

A restless dream takes hold of him instead, one full of unease and caused only by sheer exhaustion. He falls right where he is standing, truly, smudged inbetween Hayes and two other people whose faces he cannot recognize in the dark. It is as though his muscles truly abandon him now, all the stubborn courage to hold the body upright evaporating from him as easily as water in the presence of overwhelming heat.

When his eyes close, he dreams of a red-stained moor, snowflakes painting the bloodied picture with brush strokes of the most fine artist.

He sees himself there, just as bloodied as the moor itself, though his soul doesn't possess the body that is supposedly his. He is brought to his feet by men, good men, faceless men, and yet a piece of him remains on the late battlefield. A small, incredibly important part, one which he meant to protect with his life if need be, now destined to be covered by snow and alas be forgotten.

A dragonfly in amber.

Whilist his body is being willed away by a pair of hands, good hands, faceless hands, his soul remains where the gemstone presses against soil that is still freshly moist with blood. Perhaps he is destined to stay here forever, in this purgatory on Earth, in his most darkest dreams, for he failed to protect it.

He failed her. He knows he did. The realization makes it that much harder to bear the pain that comes with having lost that part of himself forever.

Jamie is right there, technically, just out of reach of his most cherished gemstone that should have never been discarded in such a way, yet he is not. Either his hands deceive him or he has no hands at all, for he cannot reach the single piece of amber, only duly stare at it as though any milisecond of looking would change anything at all.

So he looks.

Hours upon hours pass, it seems, and dawn is soon to rise, but he still looks. It seems he cannot escape that part of himself after all. Whatever bond that binds him to Claire appears to bind him to the gemstone that was their wedding gift, too.

The snow keeps on falling. Dawn arises. Jamie keeps on looking. Either his eyes deceive him or he has no eyes at all, for they cannot seem to avoid staring at the lonely dragonfly in amber even if he struggles not to. Jamie watches the speckles of golden glimmering sparkles dance amidst the core of the amber for what feels like centuries upon centuries, and just when it truly feels like it is all for naught, the little piece of amber pulsates with a faint light.

Either his mind deceives him or he has no mind at all, for he cannot will away the unimaginable things happening before his very eyes, in this cruel, twisted dream of his. The amber melts into the soil almost as easily as snow upon the first touch of sunlight, in small streaks of yellow and silver.

Then, it is just the dragonfly, lone and forgotten, unmoving against the moor.

Jamie looks for what feels like utter millennia before the little dragonfly's wings flutter ever so faintly as it readies itself to fly away.

He attempts to reach closer with what would presumably be his right hand, praying, begging that the dragonfly sit at his palm, gasping, "I'm nae ready to let go yet!"

 _I willna ever be ready_ , he tells his own thoughts, though it is as clear as day even when left unsaid.

A new sun rises in the distance, painting the great moor in a myriad of yellows and pinks, such beauty highly inappropriate in a place of such sin and horror. The dragonfly dances on, flying little tentative circles before what Jamie assumes are his eyes. It lingers on like that for what feels like... forever.

"Will ye no' let go of me?" Jamie asks, a lone breath caught in his breast, one he cannot seem to let out, "Why on Earth would ye no' let go of me now? You promised! You cannae do that!"

Though his body is long gone from the great bloodied moor, his soul remained.

Though _hers_ is long gone from his time and space, unimaginable lenghts seperating them for what might as well be greater than forever, her soul remained right here, too.

"Ye left your heart here, wi' me." Jamie chuckles, invisible tears falling down his surreal cheeks though they are just as real, if only just as painful, "Ye fool... I was meant to let ye go at the stones forever... Now I know I cannae even try, for I will be doomed to fail time and time again."

It's the start of a new day. Birds are chirping, gnawing away at the freshly rotting corpses covering the entirety of this hell on Earth that should not be romanticized this way or any way at all. The dragonfly looks at the far-away sun longingly as it calls for it -- no, _for her_ , and, though it pains Jamie to admit so, the dragonfly's wings flutter with an imminent desire to fly away.

"Ye must go now, eh? I understand." Jamie's face lights up with what could only be described as a painful smile, the smile of a man so in love it shall break him in half only to leave no pieces at all, tear his limbs away one by one until all there is left is the raw, pure love, lone and great.

" _Mo nighean donn_ , I shall meet ye again in wee dreams like such... I willna let go of ye, or the love I bear for ye, until my last dying breath and further still."

Jamie chokes away a sob as the dragonfly flies peacefully into the mesmerising sunrise. For once in his life, he isn't entirely sure whether what he saw in his dream was indeed false. It felt real. It felt true.

His eyes open abruptly. There is no sunlight to be seen.

Tears start dwelling in his eyes for he cannot stop them anymore before willing his body accross the filthy floor with all the little might left in his muscles. He forces himself to move though it causes him great pain to do so, each intake of breath piercing arrows through his lungs just as violently as his legs cry out from being bruised and malnourished. He covers himself in all sorts of filth on his way before defiantly burying his face in a chest that's all too close and all too far, so familiar yet never in his life more foreign.

Murtagh stirs awake at once, ears filling with the raw sound of Jamie weeping, and it seems as though his heart breaks this very second. He embraces him hastily, leaving a gentle kiss on the top of his head, allowing him the freedom of breaking down crying when no one would expect him to. Not Mac Dubh, Red Jamie, the strongest there ever was amidst them... though, so it seems, he, too, has a heart just real as any of theirs and it, too, pains greatly.

"Jamie, lad, everything is okay," Murtagh tells him, mumbling into the messy curls of his hair that faintly resemble what they used to be, "Dinna fash... Ye're safe with me, right here. It cannae get ye here."

It felt as though the world were ending, for a moment, truly.

A streak of lightning pierced the sky in half with a momentary glimmer of purple, the noise causing most of the men to startle awake much alike Jamie. It brought him back to all the worst times in his life, the loneliest and the darkest, all engulfed in that similar damned darkness that never seemed to evade his nightmares. He shook and wept, failing to escape this nightmare with each attempt at a shake, a tremor, none of which made him feel any closer to escaping Ardsmuir prison, the prison caused by the shackles on his wrists and ankles, nor, finally, the prison of his entire being itself.

Murtagh endured through it all with the calmness of a saint, holding Jamie in his arms as though so long he were there, he could not fall apart. Jamie prayed so to tell him otherwise, but the words never did escape his mouth.

It didn't help that he could hardly decipher the rain beating against the stone walls from the all-too-familiar noise of pistols being fired from afar, all too similar, all too loud.

The world appeared to be so much more quieter in Murtagh's arms.

"I dinna like thunderstorms, ye ken," Jamie chokes, though this isn't nearly the full truth of it, a scarce smile threatening to fall upon his face yet not quite there, "Never did."

"Oh, I ken." Murtagh forces back a response, another coughing fit on the edge of his tongue, like countless others that have been haunting him all throughout winter. "I've known ye since you were a wee lad, Jamie. There can hardly be a secret ye could've kept from me all those years."

The storm rages on with the same burning passion their hearts used to beat with, beating away at the small window of the great cell. It brought cold with it, terrible cold, and gruesome thoughts moreover. During nights like such, it was tough to remember sunshine ever came after the terrible storm.

Sunshine... Oh, it's but a distant ray of foreign warmth, far, far from where they are. They are not worthy to feel its embrace, or perhaps it is because of the weight of their sins that they are forced to repent whilist still pathetically holding onto life. Jamie realizes he shall never posess answers to such questions, yet they cease to haunt him nonetheless. He will never get nowhere near as close to the sun as the dragonfly did in his dream, as--

He attempts to brush away the remaining tears maiming his face, causing him to wince in pain rather than in fear of the storm.

"Do they bother ye so?"

For a terrifying moment, he fears Murtagh truly has the ability to read his mind like a most finely printed book. He then remembers again the shackles on his wrists as Murtagh looks them down, and the worry is temporarily lifted off his chest. Jamie almost has it in him to chuckle, were it not for his vocal chords to have forgotten how to function properly, it seems. At times, he has trouble remembering the sound of his own laughter.

In truth, he has problems remembering most things. Others, he cannot seem to ever will away and simply forget.

"Aye," Jamie nudges at one of the shackles engulfing his wrists, watching the purple bruise as it blooms and greatens, a freshly healed cut threatening to open yet again, "I imagine they're doing their job alright, then."

"Suppose so. Damn the English for keeping ye like this, especially throughout this cold." Murtagh's lip twitches as the space inbetween his eyebrows wrinkles with strained effort, "It'd be a miracle if yer hands don't fall off your arms someday this winter, and wouldna that be a shame? Though I suppose there's at least a hundred hands here that willna complain a bit to get the chance to feed ye."

"I willna ask for their pity. Only yours, perhaps."

Murtagh's chest heaves with a weak laugh, "You treat yer old man like this? Shame on ye, Jamie, shame on ye."

Jamie scratches away at his hands absentmindedly, watching the faint streaks of red come and go before they are replaced by the sickly purple tinge he cannot seem to get rid of. The storm rages on and, with it, the mighty tremors in his mind and thoughts. Jamie wills himself to sit next to Murtagh, as though the closer he can get, the higher the possibility of this terrible dream ending.

"Yer mother used to sing you this song, when you were verra young." Murtagh grimaces in a sudden rush of pain, his fever still taking the better of him, leaving him only more cold and more exposed to the unrelenting frost. Jamie collects the lone bead of sweat running down his brow, feeling the sickly warmth under his skin, tucking them further underneath their molding gray blanket. "It always calmed ye down during the worst thunderstorms in Lallybroch, yet I cannae remember it for the life of me. Suppose that's best for the both o' us now, aye?"

"Tell me about her, Murtagh, I beg ye." Jamie whispers, so quiet it could have been missed alongside the roaring of the wind around them, "I'm afraid it could be the only solitude I'll ever get to encounter again."

"Dinna say that, fool." Murtagh looks him in the eye and it's almost, almost like the old times, but not quite, "Ye need to be strong. Don't lose yer hope. Die with it, if it comes to that, but dinna _ever_ lose it."

Murtagh's chest heaves with a hollow cough that causes his whole body to go through a fit of tremors. The prisoners around them move and mumble, engaging in conversations that are not theirs to witness. Jamie holds Murtagh's hand ferociously, hearing lone joints cracking as caused by the mere grasp, clutching it tightly as though all of his remaining health could be passed onto his godfather in such a primitive manner. Murtagh smiles, but it's full of pity. He cannot blame him, not really.

What do they have left, if not stupid hopes to latch onto when everything else has already failed?

"She was always verra kind, Ellen. Bonny. The most bonny lass I had ever seen, and yet of course she had eyes for another."

Murtagh wedges himself into the space inbetween Jamie's arm and his chest, throwing his head back against Jamie's shoulder as though holding it upright was too much pain in itself. Jamie's hand reaches to untangle Murtagh's hair in slow caresses, working the knots away as though they were back in Paris, thoroughly pampered and clean from bathing in the most fine oils.

"Oh, but I couldna forget her even if I tried. I stood by her side all this time regardless, for I couldna deny your father was a good man. Honourable, just like you," Murtagh gives Jamie's hand a small caress, "If only a little less stubborn."

"How could ye stay in Lallybroch? She couldna love you back, and yet ye stayed nonetheless..."

"She needed me, Jamie." Murtagh sighs, and his voice falters, "Aye, it was a bit different than what I had wanted for myself, but she still needed me. I couldna just leave."

Jamie winces when another thunder hits at the side of the prison before Murtagh hurries to calm him. In his embrace, he felt so distressingly small, yet incredibly safe.

"Then, of course, I lingered about to look after the bairns." a rare smile graces Murtagh's face, much to Jamie's utmost surprise, "Wee William and Jenny... It pained me for some time when I looked at them and couldna see myself in them whatsoever, but ye Frasers are my family. My only family."

"Please don't stop." Jamie mumbles, shifting his legs underneath the scruffy blanket, the shackles playing a sick melody that reverberates throughout the entire cell, "Whatever it is ye're doing to calm the storm in my head, it's working."

He could pracitcally feel the smile on Murtagh's face though he couldn't properly see it, only guess, only hope. Murtagh curled a lone strand of his copper hair inbetween his fingers, leaving no care for the sweat and the dirt that maimed it, instead holding it like it is his most prized treasure.

"I couldna stay in Lallybroch forever, of course. When I returned, Ellen bore the most braw bairn I had ever seen. A bonny little laddie, with hair just as fiery as his mother's, and a sharp tongue to match." Murtagh ruffles Jamie's hair, though it lacks the conviction it used to bear, "I know love when I see it, _mo charaid_. And yer mother loved ye dearly. I couldna help but love ye, either."

A particularly grim thunder hits, and yet Jamie doesn't move a muscle.

"Oh, aye. I loved all of Ellen's bairns, but you, most of all." Murtagh speaks into nothingness, so quiet yet not even the most relentless rain could silence him, "I knelt at yer mother's feet and pledged to her I would follow ye always and keep ye from all harm... I didna always do that oath justice, I'm afraid."

"Ye're keeping me safe right now." Jamie looks to watch Murtagh's eyes as he speaks to him, clutching a lone hand against his shoulder though it tries to bring him down so, "Why should anything else matter?"

"I failed ye so many times, Jamie, lad," one of Murtagh's fingers makes way to brush away at a single tear collecting at the side of Jamie's eye, "Ye should've let go o' me a long time ago."

"I am never letting ye go," Jamie's hand moves to clutch on Murtagh's jaw, a weak grasp, if only a little desperate, " _Never_ , ye hear me?"

"Oh, aye," tears begin to dwell in Murtagh's eyes and, for once, Jamie doesn't see Culloden. He sees a scene of his finest imagination, one unlikely to have ever happened but just as real notwithstanding -- wee Jamie in his crib, if only a week old, with Murtagh watching over him, same as he will do for years to come. "I hear ye well, Mac Dubh."

"Dinna call me that, man," Jamie rubs away at the bones of his forearms, trying to ease the dull ache they will likely never forget, "I'm nae deserving of it. I shouldna have been brought here in the first place, let alone been made an example of... 'Tis not the fate I would have chosen for myself."

There is evident sorrow in Murtagh's voice when he speaks, as well as grave weariness, "We dinna get to choose our own fate, Jamie. We're a wasted generation that shall never see their bairns grow auld. The white roses of Scotland they call us, but flowers wither, and so shall we soon enough."

"All this trying to stop the inevitable from happening..." Jamie whispers, unable to recognize his own voice anymore, quietened further against the hollow of Murtagh's neck, "All for naught."

" _She_ survived, Jamie! And your wee bairn! It wasnae all for naught."

Air catches at Jamie's throat, and his head feels dizzy. The world starts spinning around him again, and soon these walls would inevitably eat him alive. His heart picks up pace, though up to this point he didn't believe it possible, and a weak groan catches in his throat. He cannot tell if it is for anger or for sadness but when his heart drops, he feels the most lonely he has felt in a long time.

Perhaps he wasn't ready to hear those words spoken out loud. The possibility of his family being out there somewhere, in a far better time and space, safe and sound... it seemed surreal. He couldn't bring himself to believe it.

"Do _not_ speak of my wife, Murtagh Fitzgibbons," Jamie chokes out, fingers twitching, "or the bairn she carried. I willnae hear any of it."

Jamie's shoulders heave as he attempts to catch his breath, focusing on a spot far in the starlit sky wherein the rain is painting an invisible masterpiece.

"I'm sorry, Jamie, I didna want to anger ye." Murtagh sighs, "I havena stopped thinking o' them ever since we first came here, of the life they may lead in their time. It brings me solace, and I hoped it would be the same wi' ye."

His body tremors with emotions that have long been repressed and should never have been, such great longing and sorrow that might eventually drive him to insanity. He cracks his knuckles and tries his best to stop focusing on the storm outside because he knows this is what Claire would have wanted, what she would have advised him to do.

_Och, Claire..._

"Ye're no' wrong, Murtagh, not entirely. Ye need no' apologize."

If he closes his eyes long enough and represses every negative thought that attempts to gnaw at him, he can imagine the sharp edges of her face, the softness of her lips, the way her hair engulfed her face and kissed her cheeks. He fears one day he will close his eyes and the picture would be gone, forgotten, taken away from him by the merciless power time holds over them all. He fears it dearly, aye, though inside he latches onto the knowledge that such love can never be forgotten, with no amounts of time that could attempt to ruin it for him, for them both.

If he closes his eyes long enough, he feels loved again. It is why he sometimes dreads the life he has been forced to live and so dearly longs for the embrace of death, however sudden it may be, for death means he will be able to see her again. He would have to tread through heaven or hell, and perhaps the purgatory, too, if need be, but he would find her.

He will always find her.

Despite the cruel frost that bites at his fingertips, they have not yet forgotten the feel of Claire's skin underneath his hands, warmer, smoother, all more pure and heavenly. No cold can take that from him.

"It's only... I miss it, sometimes, when I lose control over myself and let go." Jamie speaks, cocking his head slightly in an attempt to watch the moon tower above them more clearly, "Family. 'Tis why it pains me so to think of it... part of me wishes it simpler to purely forget everything."

"Yes..." Murtagh breathes, his throat unbearably dry when he speaks and not a droplet of water to dull the ache, "Family. Ye'd risk your entire life and more purely for the sake of their wellbeing. Ye'd kill for them and ye'd die for them, all the while ye dinna even ken why. The not knowing... perhaps that truly is what makes it all worthwhile."

"I couldna forget them even if I tried."

"Dinna you ken why that is, though?" Murtagh smiles, a single light in the eternal darkness, "It's because they are in our every heartbeat. We are not the same without them, and that is exactly why we would risk so much just to see them safe and sound, if only for one moment."

"So ye don't think it's all for naught?" Jamie says quietly, eyes boring holes into the ceiling as though searching for something, someone, "Ye really believe that our sacrifice bears so much meaning for them and all future generations of Scots to come?"

"Oh, aye," Murtagh chuckles quietly but it sounds hollow, so unlike how it used to be, "That is exactly what I think."

Jamie still sees the same strength in Murtagh's unfaltering gaze, even now, overcome by the relentless cold that holds them prisoner just as much as the stone walls of Ardsmuir prison. It's the solitude he so desperately craves, one he never wishes to ask for but knows would be granted nonetheless. There is a hope in those eyes that makes Jamie feel as though all can be good in the world so long as they have each other's backs. It's childish, perhaps, to take so much love from our closest family like we are starving without it, yet that never stopped him before.

There is no Jamie Fraser without Murtagh Fitzgibbons Fraser, it seems. Not really.

Without Murtagh, he is but a shell, a memory of the better times that used to be. A fire that shone so brightly and died so suddenly, never to lose its spark completely but never to regain its full shine, either.

Together, they create a fire that truly radiates unimaginable warmth to all those welcome to sit beside it, as it is expected of the family hearth. They are the last of a kind. They might not be wearing their tartans now but they have never, not for a second, fogotten them. What is a clan, anyway, if not a big family?

And what is a family, if not the constant readiness to die beside each other, hand in hand, most eager to seek the other's smile before closing our eyes on this world forever?

"I'm glad ye're here with me, man." Jamie whispers, the words knives at his heart, turning to look at him and to go straight back into his arms, if only a little hesitantly, "It is selfish of me to say, aye, but I wouldnae have lasted this long were it not for you."

"Jamie, lad," Murtagh holds him closer, the warmth that never truly died despite the cruel weather conditions, a weary hand going through his copper hair, "I am but a dead man clutching at everything he holds dear."

"Not dead yet."

"Aye," Murtagh mumbles into his red curls that, too, lost their shine, "I'm still here, lad. I'm nae going anywhere. Ye'll no rid of me that easily."

It's good enough for now. When he holds his godfather's hand and imagines them years ago, Murtagh teaching him how to pitch a sword or play chess, it's genuinely close enough to feeling like home. If Murtagh's presence is all there is left of home, then he shall hold onto it until the end of his days. He never says it, but it doesn't need to be spoken aloud.

The prison sleeps in relative silence, for once. There truly is naught but the distant thunderstorm and the quiet weeps that Jamie allows himself from time to time, for what feels like the last tears he can ever utter in this lifetime. He holds Murtagh's hand for what feels like eternity, even once their hands feel as though they would fall off. It's not enough to fill the gaping hole inside his heart, and it'll never be, for such things can never heal properly.

"Will ye lay wi' me until the storm ends?" Jamie asks in a whisper, eyes focused on the half-moon as though if he looked for plenty enough time, it would become whole again. Though he knows such things cannot happen, he hopes all the same. "We'll be warmer that way and find rest more easily, perhaps."

"Ye need no' ask, _mo charaid_." Murtagh squeezes Jamie's hand and replies defiantly, "Ye'll never need to ask. I would hand down my life for ye if it ensured ye're safe and sound."

"I dinna believe I'll ever be safe and sound again, not truly."

"Oh, ye never ken." Murtagh ruffles his hair, a lone finger brushing away the remaining tears on his cheeks, "Now lay your bloody arse on the floor and get comfortable, for I cannae do that for ye."

Momentarily, it appeared as though the closer Jamie got to Murtagh, the more worries managed to escape his head to finally leave him in relative peace. If only it truly were that easy...

The storm is finally nearing to a close as they lie against one another. It's difficult to pretend as though any position to lie in is comfortable whatsoever when he is forcefully restrained with so many links and chains at all times, but he has for sure endured worse. For now, Murtagh's relatively warm, defiantly unchained hand reaches over his torso to touch the spot underneath which his heart lays, to ignite even a single spark of warmth. They realize that the closer they be, the easier the relentless cold will be to endure.

The night carries on forever, it seems. Though the rain outside begins to slow down, it never quite dies, and neither does the tension inside Jamie's body that rustles each of his nerves to the point of unbearable awareness of everything around him. Everyone's breath has suddenly become an orchestra of the most fine instruments, the walls themselves appear to hum and talk, and the mold on the blanket stubbornly bites away at his ankles.

The only good thing in this place, or perhaps even on this planet, is Murtagh's arm around his body, holding him in place, holding him whole. The temporary solitude brings a weary smile onto Jamie's face and with it, a scarce amount of tears that are barely there, that barely bother him at all.

It is in such serenity that Jamie whispers, "I dreamed o' her, ye ken?"

Silence. The steady rise and fall of Murtagh's chest against the skin of his back.

"It was as if she was truly here wi' me, as though she never left... She made me feel calmer about my imminent death, aye, but she also ignited in me... hope," Jamie speaks quietly into nothingness, confessing in Murtagh his heart's most true sorrows, most honest wishes, most personal demons. "That I could see her again, in dreams like such and then in the afterlife. I could possibly endure two hundred years of purgatory if I must, aye, but she will be there, then, and it'll all be worth it in the end."

Last single droplets of rain wash down the prison walls as Jamie breathes his first calm breath and is alas reborn, or perhaps back to the person he used to be. Cleansed of his sorrows and his sins, the pain in his head and his heart finally evades him.

Jamie lets out a barely audible breathy laugh for he is subsequently free, though thoroughly bound and restrained, but a free man indeed.

"I ken she is nae truly here, but the thought doesna pain me as much anymore. I'm beginning to make my peace wi' it, though I ken I will never truly accept it. How could I?" Jamie's teeth worry at his bottom lip as he attempts to collect his thoughts, "I miss her so much, Murtagh, I fear it's going to be the death o' me."

Perhaps his ears deceive him or he has no ears at all, for he can hear unmistakable distant fluttering of little wings somewhere in the air around him, flying carelessly for the storm is finally gone.

His dragonfly is there to protect him, free of the amber that was hers for so very long, but still the same dragonfly he has always known and longed for.

"Claire never left ye, Jamie, not truly." Murtagh's voice takes him away from his reverie for a most brief moment, "She's right here wi' ye. She'll always be."

Murtagh's hand caresses over the place underneath which Jamie's heart lays, thoroughly covered by layers of cloth, skin, flesh and bone. Though it beats slowly and only slightly, it is still undeniably there, and with it, buried deep inside never to leave nor to be forgotten, the love he bears for her. It is purely for that thought that he finds rest that night, true rest, so unlike anything he has felt these past few months.

Claire is here with him. In a sick, twisted way, and such circumstances under which no pair of lovers should ever be forced, but with him nonetheless. That alone makes all the difference in the world.

Perhaps he can survive this after all, if only for her. Purgatory can always wait a little longer.

**Author's Note:**

> "He was sitting against a tussock near the middle of the field— Murtagh. He'd been struck a dozen times at least, and there was a dreadful wound in his head— I knew he was dead."
> 
> He hadn't been, though; when Jamie had fallen to his knees beside his godfather and taken the small body in his arms, Murtagh's eyes had opened.
> 
> "He saw me. And he smiled." And then the older man's hand had touched his cheek briefly. "Dinna be afraid, a bhalaich," Murtagh had said, using the endearment for a small, beloved boy. "It doesna hurt a bit to die."
> 
> — Diana Gabaldon, from "Voyager"


End file.
